The New Purge: Poland Set To Boost Screening For Communist-era Informers
WARSAW (AP)--Poland's parliament overwhelmingly approved Friday a bill that will expand greatly the screening of public officials, company bosses, journalists and others in an effort to root out communist-era secret police informers.
Lawmakers in the conservative-dominated lower house voted 372-44 to widen the list of public officials who must be vetted. The bill also foresees the publication of a list of secret police officers and informers.
Employers would be entitled to use evidence of collaboration as grounds for dismissal.
Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski and his conservative Law and Justice party made a priority of rooting out corruption and removing ex-communists from positions of power when they won parliamentary elections last fall.
Under the new law, the number of people required to undergo screening is expected to swell from the current 27,000 to several hundred thousand.
Those being vetted will in the future include diplomats, municipal officials, heads of state-owned companies, editors, publishers, journalists and school directors, among others. To date, only leading public officials were subject to vetting.
The bill also shifts screening responsibilities from an ombudsman and special courts to the Institute of National Remembrance, a state body that holds communist-era files and makes them available to victims, historians and journalists.
All individuals who hold important public posts or a position of public trust and were born before Aug. 1, 1972 will be required to seek a certificate from the Institute of National Remembrance saying whether or not they collaborated with the secret police before communism fell in 1989.
Currently, those who run for public office must simply declare whether they collaborated or not.
There is no penalty for admitting collaboration, but those who cover it up and are caught face a 10-year ban from holding office.
Some, particularly on the right of the political spectrum, have been calling for a wider-ranging effort to expose former collaborators.
The issue of secret police files is sensitive in Poland, where having collaborated with the communist-era authorities is viewed as disgraceful by many. But after communism fell in 1989, democratic leaders stopped short of purging informers from public life.
The bill passed Friday still needs approval by the senate, where it is expected to pass easily. Link
WARSAW (AP)--Poland's parliament overwhelmingly approved Friday a bill that will expand greatly the screening of public officials, company bosses, journalists and others in an effort to root out communist-era secret police informers.
Lawmakers in the conservative-dominated lower house voted 372-44 to widen the list of public officials who must be vetted. The bill also foresees the publication of a list of secret police officers and informers.
Employers would be entitled to use evidence of collaboration as grounds for dismissal.
Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski and his conservative Law and Justice party made a priority of rooting out corruption and removing ex-communists from positions of power when they won parliamentary elections last fall.
Under the new law, the number of people required to undergo screening is expected to swell from the current 27,000 to several hundred thousand.
Those being vetted will in the future include diplomats, municipal officials, heads of state-owned companies, editors, publishers, journalists and school directors, among others. To date, only leading public officials were subject to vetting.
The bill also shifts screening responsibilities from an ombudsman and special courts to the Institute of National Remembrance, a state body that holds communist-era files and makes them available to victims, historians and journalists.
All individuals who hold important public posts or a position of public trust and were born before Aug. 1, 1972 will be required to seek a certificate from the Institute of National Remembrance saying whether or not they collaborated with the secret police before communism fell in 1989.
Currently, those who run for public office must simply declare whether they collaborated or not.
There is no penalty for admitting collaboration, but those who cover it up and are caught face a 10-year ban from holding office.
Some, particularly on the right of the political spectrum, have been calling for a wider-ranging effort to expose former collaborators.
The issue of secret police files is sensitive in Poland, where having collaborated with the communist-era authorities is viewed as disgraceful by many. But after communism fell in 1989, democratic leaders stopped short of purging informers from public life.
The bill passed Friday still needs approval by the senate, where it is expected to pass easily. Link
posted by BEING HAD at 2:33 AM
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